Police and first responders at the Villanova University campus in Villanova, Pa., on Thursday, Aug. 21, 2025, where an active shooter was reported, later confirmed to be a hoax. Read more Yong Kim / Staff Photographer

by Max Marin Published Aug. 21, 2025, 8:50 p.m. ET

Late Thursday afternoon, police rushed to Villanova University over a report of an active shooter — later determined to be a hoax — searching for someone who did not exist and at one point misidentifying a victim of a gunshot wound who had not been shot, according to police scanner recordings.

Just after 4:30 p.m., police broadcast a warning about “a subject with an automatic rifle” at the Catholic university just outside Philadelphia. The source of that information was not clear. But a chaotic manhunt soon erup

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